-Kenshin Himura
The fields of Tocasia--situated within a ring of mountains on the world of Atlas--became Aaron's new home. Together with Elowyn, Tenshi's other apprentice, Aaron received training in martial arts, the use of magic, healing, and so forth, rounding out his physical, mental, and spiritual character. As was natural, Aaron developed deep feelings for Elowyn, but never took them beyond the recesses of his mind. As also was natural, time took its toll on Tenshi, and eventually the elderly man passed away.
Atlas was a planet within the same system as Earth. Fifth in orbit, it was the most distant from the Sun of the four planets capable of supporting life. Of these four planets, only Venus, Mars, and Atlas were inhabited by civilizations, with Earth designated a wildlife preserve. At that time, Venus and Mars were also rich with life.
Venus was a world of people who valued natural life and lived in harmony with it, though their technology was just as advanced that of Atlas and Mars. The people of Venus lived much longer lives than those of Atlas and Mars, for it was populated by the race known as Elves. Atlas and Mars, on the other hand, were the homeworlds of Humanity.
Atlas was a technological utopia. Unlike Venus, the people of Atlas prioritized their own well-being over that of the natural world, but they were not ignorant of its importance. They lived in dense cities separated by vast areas of little-disturbed natural terrain, but their technology allowed their cities to exist without polluting their surroundings.
Due to extensive, unrestricted industrial growth earlier in its history, Mars had been slowly dying. Delegates from the planet had long been lobbying for use of Earth a new homeworld for their people, arguing that they were fully capable of preserving wildlife on that planet just as the people of Venus and Atlas had done on their respective worlds. The people of Venus, however, vehemently opposed any such movement, arguing that the worlds of Man were those that they already inhabited. The people of Atlas and Venus were not blind to Mars' plight, however, offering them whatever aid possible. Venus made every effort to revivify the planet while Atlas allowed Martians to migrate in controlled groups to their world.
In the opinion of the Martian ruling council, however, the aid was too little to be effective. If they could not be granted a new homeworld, they would have no other choice but to take it. War was the inevitable result. Mars was a strong world, practiced in the arts of battle and technologically prepared for war, but Venus and Atlas were certainly not unprepared.
The war went on for many years, with gains and losses on both sides. Nothing could be decided, however, without an invasion of the enemy's homeworld. Tragically, both of Mars' attempts ended in catastrophe. The first cataclysm came with the attempted invasion of Venus. During the battle, one of Mars' interstellar battleships descended into the planet's atmosphere in an effort to support the landing by destroying ground defenses. These defenses proved entirely too effective, however, when they critically damaged the experimental vessel. The ship's power core breached, causing a chain reaction that transformed the atmosphere of Venus and forever destroying the planet's ability to support life. Heat could not esacepe, and over the next few decades, she became the world she is known as today.
The second cataclysm was not so directly the fault of Mars as the first. The fields of Tocasia, surrounded by mountains and in relatively close proximity to the capitol city of Atlas, proved to be the most strategically advantageous landing point for an invasion of the planet. Lord General Athos, Mars' greatest military leader, commanded a fleet of ships accounted by the allied worlds to have been either lost or destroyed in pervious battles. The Lost Fleet, as it was called, conducted a surprise invasion of Atlas by cloaking its movements both technologically and by movement under cover of worlds and other bodies in strategic locations that time of the system cycle.
In pursuit of their training following the death of their master, Aaron and Elowyn had not involved themselves in the war before that day. When the Martian ships began to descend from the sky and the Atlans scrambled to deploy defenders, Elowyn insisted on supporting the defending forces in support of defending hers and Aaron's home. Aaron, finding his protests futile, dedicated himself to protecting her while she did what she could to erect defensive shields and lend healing aid to the Atlans.
This interference did not go unnoticed by Lord General Athos. Though magic users were common in society, those of Elowyn's and Aaron's caliber were exceptionally rare. In fact, other than himself, Athos knew of no others who could match them. It was possible, he believed, that these two could prove a serious hindrance to his efforts. Wielding a sword capable of trapping the souls of its fallen adversaries, Lord General Athos decided to deal with these two personally.
The boy was the lesser of the two threats, or so Athos believed. While Elowyn was tending to a wounded Atlan soldier and while Aaron was distracted maintaining a barrier assigned to him by his cohort, Athos teleported before her and drove his sword through her heart, killing her instantly and catching her soul within his blade. Witnessing this, Aaron cried out in horror, abandoning his post and teleporting to Elowyn's fallen body. He wasted no time with Athos, teleporting away before the man could strike at him. The threats gone, Lord General Athos returned to his flagship to oversee the invasion efforts.
Aaron had taken Elowyn to the capitol city, frantically attempting to revive her and, upon failing, searching out the aid of someone who could. Busy with their own troubles and given her condition, there was nothing any Atlan healer could do to save the young woman. His grief transformed itself to anger and hatred. Tears staining his face, he lay his beloved down, encased her in crystal, and instructed the healers to guard her until his return. Without waiting for an answer, he exploded through the building's roof and descended like a missile into the middle of the battle.
Aaron's rage shattered the seal that Tenshi had placed over his power so many years before and without hesitation he began to lay waste to the Martian forces. Infantry, tanks, aircraft, and artillery--all began to vanish, consumed in violent eruptions of white fire. Surveying from above, Lord General Athos saw a power unlike anything he had seen before and realized that within this boy lay the potential to conquer everything. Before he could stop them, however, one of his starships fired upon the boy. The blast was effective only in alerting Aaron of their presence, however. In his rage, the young man created an array of localized gravitational singularities that destroyed the fleet, but not before Athos could teleport to the scene.
Desolation was what Athos found upon his arrival. Scarred earth, mangled wreckage, and scores of corpses. Yes, this young man was precisely what could power his ambition. He approached Aaron, but before he could complete his first sentence, Aaron recognized this man as he who had slain Elowyn. In a cry of rage, Aaron assaulted Athos as he had assaulted the Martians - with bolts of white fire from his hands.
Athos was not the greatest military leader in Martian history because he looked good in a uniform, nor was he defenseless against Aaron's uncontrolled wrath. Several times he tried to tempt the boy, but each time his words were met with escalating force. Aaron did everything he could to kill this man, but each time he failed. Athos could withstand or dodge every one of Aaron's assaults and his swordsmanship effortlessly deflected the boy's bladed attacks. Realizing that he could not convince the boy, Athos entered battle determined to kill Aaron. He would not succeed, however, for Aaron, in his desperation, drew upon his knowledge of astrophysics and his unsealed power to tap into the heart of a nearby galaxy: the singularity of the supermassive black hole at its center. A beam of energy that could have easily shattered the Solar system descended upon Athos, not only obliterating the man's soul but also enveloping the entire field in a cataclysmic explosion that destabilized the planet's crust.
To the witness of the surviving Atlan forces, Aaron emerged from the holocaust carrying only Athos' shattered sword, its captured souls released into Atlas' lifestream. They knew not who he was, only that he had become their ally in defeating the Martians. He took up a position on the Atlan flagship, destroying without hesitation any Martian vessel that refused to surrender. He spoke rarely, and none dared ask him his name. In testimony to his actions at Tocasia and in the ensuing battles, he came to be called the Julian Tempest, a name which literally meant "tumultuous storm of power."
The Martians surrendered shortly thereafter. With the condition of the three worlds, all parties involved agreed to settle on Earth as their new homeworld. The Martians established the Empire of Heva on the continent of Mu in the Pacific Ocean while the Atlans established Atlantis. The surviving Elves dispersed themselves amongst the wildlands of both empires, choosing to isolate themselves from the political affairs of Humanity which had accomplished the destruction of three planets.
Three months after the Battle of Tocasia, Atlas exploded. Its lifestream, suddenly and violently freed from its vessel, streaked through space and merged with that of Earth in much the same way as the lifestreams of two war-destroyed worlds would millenia later collide and merge with the soul of a young man destined to become Julian Tempest.
Julian Tempest spent the following millenia searching the planes for a way to recall Elowyn's spirit from the lifestream. But that...is another story. [cue Conan theme]